New Dropout Data Highlight Problems In the Middle Years

New dropout data from Chicago and New York City suggest that
students in the middle grades may be at greater risk of leaving school
than previously thought.

Both sets of data, released last week, reinforce an assumption that
is growing in the research community: that those most likely to become
dropouts need intervention programs long before they reach high
school.

The new information also underscores, according to experts, the
depth of the data-collection problem in this area--at both the
high-school and the middle-school levels.

In Chicago, researchers from Loyola University found in a study of
previously unreleased statistics that 5.5 percent of the district's
8th-grade students dropped out before starting high school. Because
they are not legally allowed to leave school until age 16, many of
these students become officially "lost" in the bureaucracy, the study
found, and are never tracked.

The New York City data, meanwhile, indicate that 40 percent of
students entering city high schools are more than a year behind in
their studies, and that more than 30 percent have been absent 10 or
more days during the previous semester. Both statistics are considered
by experts to be strong indicators for potential dropouts.

"We don't know a lot about this group [middle-school students],"
said Aaron M. Pallas, an assistant professor of sociology and education
at Teachers' College, Columbia University, and a researcher in the
field. "But the expectation is that the ones who are dropping out
earlier are the ones who have experienced the worst failure in
school."

'One of the Weakest Links'

The new data come as both federal and state officials are paying
increasing attention to the need for more accurate dropout
information.

Last month, federal education officials announced that 27 states and
the District of Columbia would test, for the first time, a uniform
definition of what constitutes a school dropout. Recognizing that a
significant number of students may quit school before the 9th grade,
participants in the pilot program have also agreed to begin monitoring
their students in the 7th grade.

One of the barriers to accurately gauging the "early dropout"
problem, officials say, is the fact that most formulas currently in use
measure only the high-school rate. In a few districts, however,
including Washington and Los Angeles, efforts have been made to look
beyond the high-school years. And officials there have found that more
students are abandoning school in the 7th grade than in almost any
other year.

In light of this, researchers say they are hopeful that the third
federally sponsored National Education Longitudinal Study, which was
begun last year, will give them a better picture of the extent of the
so-called "young dropout" problem. The study began with a cohort of
8th-grade students, its youngest to date. The group will be
reinterviewed in 1990, when they are scheduled to be 10th-grade
students.

James S. Catterall, an associate professor of education at the
University of California at Los Angeles, said that many districts are
dissuaded from collecting information about middle-school dropouts
because funding formulas are frequently based on enrollment data,
rather than attendance records.

Calling schools' record-keeping on students' transition from middle
school to high school "one of the weakest links" in the
dropout-prevention chain, Mr. Catterall said he does not believe that
data collection will improve until state legislatures mandate
change.

'Doesn't Ring True'

The Chicago study concluded that the city's school system
undercounts the number of children who drop out before they reach the
age of 16.

Using data provided by the district, the researchers tracked the
approximately 29,600 students who completed the 8th grade in the spring
of 1987. More than 1,600, or 5.5 percent, the researchers found, never
entered the 9th grade.

Only 64 of these students, however, had been classified by the
school system as dropouts, according to the two Loyola researchers. The
rest were considered to be lost, employed, pregnant, married, at home,
or unaccounted for.

By the fall of 1988, when the students being tracked were supposed
to enter the 10th grade, the dropout rate for the group grew to 9.5
percent, according to the study. A disproportionate number of the
dropouts, it says, came from the city's predominantly Hispanic
neighborhoods.

This relatively high pre-high-school dropout rate augments a problem
already documented at the high-school level. On average, district
officials report, more than 40 percent of the students who enter the
9th grade fail to graduate four years later.

Moreover, the Loyola researchers question some of the district's
statistics on student transfers. Nearly 2,000 of the 8th-grade students
they studied--or 6.6 percent--were reported to have transfered to a
non-public school within the city or to a school outside of Chicago by
the beginning of the 9th grade.

But the Rev. Charles L. Kyle, the principal reseacher for the study,
said he felt that the 6.6 percent figure was "inflated."

Noting that approximately 80 percent of all private-school students
in Chicago attend Catholic schools, Father Kyle said that these
schools' 9th-grade enrollments would have had to jump dramatically to
accommodate the influx of public-school children assumed by the
transfer statistics.

"It just doesn't ring true, from my experience," he said. "But
there's no way of getting accurate numbers."

Attorney General's Intervention

The Loyola study was able to be completed because of an unusual
alliance between the researchers and Attorney General Neil F. Hartigan
of Illinois. Mr. Hartigan, in fact, wrote an introduction to the study
and his office co-sponsored the report.

Father Kyle turned to Mr. Hartigan's office for help in the fall of
1987, when he was having problems getting information from the district
about its younger dropouts.

"They made phone calls when phone calls had to be made," he
said.

This was the researcher's second collaborative effort with the
Attorney General. In 1986, Mr. Hartigan's office had also co-sponsored
a study about the district's high-school dropout rate.

Robert Saigh, a spokesman for the Chicago Public Schools, said last
week that he could not comment on the new study because school
officials had not yet received a copy.

The district has no plans, he said, to alter its data-collection
system for dropouts.

Mr. Saigh added that the district has a dropout-prevention program
aimed at middle-school students. But it, like similar programs, he
said, remains underfunded.

'A Systemic Problem'

In New York City, information about that city's incoming freshman
class was compiled by the district in response to a request by The New
York Times.

In addition to its information on age and previous absence rates,
the profile indicated that many 9th graders in the city have serious
academic difficulties, as shown by their performance on standardized
tests.

Robert Tobias, director of the board of education's office of
research, evaluation, and assessment, said that the data suggest there
is "a systemic problem, not just a middle-school problem."

The school system's annual report on dropouts, also issued last
week, confirms that efforts to reduce the dropout rate must be
intensified. It shows that slightly more than 40 percent of the
9th-grade students in 1984 graduated by 1988; 20.8 percent had dropped
out and 25.3 percent were still considered to be enrolled.

According to the report, 40 percent of the class of 1988 were
overage when they entered the 9th grade, and 71 percent of the dropouts
were overage.

These figures, along with similar statistics from other urban school
districts, have convinced many that mounting greater dropout-prevention
efforts at earlier grade levels has become an essential.

"The high schools have been the center of most dropout-prevention
interest," said Mr. Pallas of Teachers' College. "A more sensible
approach would be to start earlier."

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